Reflections on life as an early career academic and researcher, curator and writer. Also known as #wordgirl, living with tiger tummy and "connecting the dots that people can't see" (Richard Hsu, TEDxShanghai)…

Forthcoming Events: Chinese art, Curating & Translation

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Continuing on from my previous post, here are more forthcoming events that I’m going to in the realm of Chinese contemporary art, curating Chinese contemporary art, transcultural and translation studies including talks, conferences and exhibition openings taking place across the UK. I will be presenting as part of events 1 and 2, which includes the 2nd UK China Arts event and the In Dialogue 2014 conference. If you can, come and hear my words, thoughts, work and projects in planning.

This is the second China UK Arts meeting that will take place in London, hosted by Natasha Phillips and Kunjue Li in collaboration with the Goldsmiths Confucius Institute for Dance and Performance. This will be a 3-hour event in which artists from different disciplines, academics, and art producers and representatives of institutions will come together and look at artistic exchanges between the two countries, understand and communicate industry practices and formal practicalities, and exchange intercultural creative ideas and working methodologies through the sharing of resources. The reason and motivation behind these series of UK China Arts meetings are threefold:

1. There is a lack of concrete foundations that are successful in support and facilitation of cross-cultural creative projects and talents.

2. It is catered to tackle specific issues that often result in the unfulfilling utilization of resources in both the UK and China.

3. We want to bring together a community of knowledge and resources that will contribute to the ever-growing amount of opportunities that are being offered and sought after within the industry.

The first meeting was hosted by Bill Aitchison at Birkbeck College in November 2014. Details of that meeting can be found here: http://ukchinaarts.blogspot.co.uk. This meeting is planned as an ongoing network and the focus at this meeting will be upon to better understand the experiences and to create opportunities for the different parties involved to meet and strengthen the network. This can be viewed from both directions as British artists working in China and Chinese artists working in the UK.

“A cross-cultural dialogue of cultural, linguistic and artistic understandings between UK and China artists and organisations.”

The speakers and topics we have presenting at this meeting are:

1. Explain what is the process of creating theatre here in the UK compared to making it in China. Regulations, funding, process, practicalities, market (background). [XiaXiao Sun, Independent film producer]XiaoXiao Sun is a London based film director, producer and the Founder, Director of Filming East Festival. She is also the General Manager of CAS. She holds an MA Documentary Degree with 9 years’ work experience on film shooting site and within a post production facility, with an in-depth understanding of Anglo-Chinese co-production.

2. The difficulties and obstacles for bringing work into the international market. [Linday Liu, news and radio presenter and documentary producer]
Lindsay Liu is a news and radio presenter and a documentary producer. Lindsay has worked in the media industry for around ten years in both the UK and China and is currently the TV presenter, director and producer of Interactive Media Britain (http://www.im-britain.com/). She used to be the News Anchor of Phoenix TV station, Radio Presenter of China National Radio station where she interviewed various of celebrities, stars, diplomats and reported on many important events as well as hosted hundreds of important events. Her credits include commercial videos: “Non-stop Plan from Beijing to Birmingham” (Producer). Documentaries: “Chinese Designers” (Director), “The only one Chinese Lady in Savile Row” (Director), “The Chinese architect in London Olympic Games” (Director).3. Propose solutions that address misunderstandings and challenge commonsense ideas about Chinese identity and customs. [Diana Yeh]Diana Yeh is Senior Lecturer in Sociology, University of Winchester. A former Fellow of Sociological Review, she also teaches on the MA Culture Diaspora Ethnicity at Birkbeck College, University of London and in Sociology and Psychosocial Studies at the University of East London. Her research interests lie in race/ethnicity, diaspora, migration and culture. Her book The Happy Hsiungs: Performing China and the Struggle for Modernity was published with Hong Kong University Press in 2014. She has presented her research on BBC Radio Four, and at institutions such as the Royal Geographical Society, the Wellcome Trust, National Portrait Gallery and Tate Britain.

4. Talk about your own experiences and explorations with your work as an international artist, specifically in China. Communicate the challenges, successes, pitfalls and loopholes and give advice to artists and companies. [David Tse, China Town Arts Space]David K.S. Tse 謝家聲 is an actor, writer, theatre director and filmmaker, developing the British Chinese / East Asian (BCEA) arts sector to improve intercultural understanding. As consultant Creative Director for CAS (chinatownartsspace.com), he engaged artists from China / UK during the Five Circles festival2008; toured to Beijing / HK with Piccadilly Revisited; secured a Cultural Olympiad Chinese commission for New Music 20×12; and in 2014, will unveil a new sculpture commission for Chinatown and develop artists’ / youth arts talent during Autumn Moon. He was Founder-Artistic Director of YellowEarth.org, where for 13 years, he led the company to become the UK’s only revenue-funded BCEA theatre, touring across UK / China.

China is here considered as both the broad Chinese speaking world (so as to include Singapore for instance) and the nation state so as to include all ethnicities and languages within PRC. This is a series of meetings designed to stimulate ideas and discussion and consolidate UK and Chinese arts networks. Further events will take place in 2015.

In Dialogueis a biannual International Symposium that interrogates how artists and researchers use dialogue in practice including a series of interdisciplinary events including presentations, discussions, communal meals, open mic sessions, live music and performance/live art showcases taking place across the city. Our aim is to create a dialogue between the different applications and understandings of the term In Dialogue, considering differences, commonalities, and how diverse approaches to understanding and articulating the theme can lead to new ways of thinking and making. In Dialogue 2014 will take place across three sites in Nottingham UK from Thursday 2nd October – Saturday 4th October 2014. In Dialogue 2014 is hosted by Nottingham Contemporary (day 1 and 2), Backlit (evening of day 2) and Primary (day 3) and co-curated by Rebecca Beinart, Heather Connelly and Rhiannon Jones, andwas founded by Heather Connelly, Viviana Checchia and Rhiannon Jones, with the first taking place in 2012, archived here: In Dialogue 2012.

The UK open exhibition returns. Since 1949 New Contemporaries has consistently provided a critical platform for new and recent fine art graduates primarily by means of an annual, nationally touring exhibition. Independent of place and democratic to the core, New Contemporaries is open to all. One of only two open exhibitions in the UK, participants are selected by a panel comprising influential art figures including curators, writers, and artists often who have themselves previously been a part of the New Contemporaries, and a rigorous process that considers the work within a broad cultural context. This year they have selected four Chinese contemporary emerging artists to show:

An evening of talks, performance, comedy, poetry and music inspired or shaped by migrations from East Asia. Diana Yeh presents her new book The Happy Hsiungs: Performing China and the Struggle for Modernity about Shih-I Hsiung, acclaimed as the first Chinese director to work in the West End and on Broadway. Actors Daniel York and Jennifer Lim read excerpts from Lady Precious Stream, the play that shot him to worldwide fame. Orwell Prize shortlisted blogger Anna Chen reads from her ‘brilliant and dangerous’ poetry collection, Reaching for my Gnu (Aaaargh! Press), and tries out some new poems. Music is provided by semi-acoustic Hapa trio Wondermare, followed by British Chinese musician/composer Liz Chi Yen Liew, who performs music from her latest album Snapshots, with Dennis Lee on the xiao (flute) and guzheng (zither), taking listeners on an evocative musical journey from China to London. The evening ends with DJ Lucky Cat Zoë playing a mixture of Chinese golden oldies from her vinyl collection blended with the freshest urban sounds from Shanghai and Beijing.

Diana Yeh is Senior Lecturer in Sociology at the University of Winchester.

Actor, writer and film-maker Daniel York has appeared at the RSC, National Theatre and Royal Court as well as in feature films including Danny Boyle’s The Beach. His short film Mercutio’s Dreaming was nominated for four awards at WIMF Festival and his stage play The Fu Manchu Complex played at Ovalhouse in 2013.‬

Actress and film-maker Jennifer Lim has appeared in feature films including Eli Roth’s cult horror smash Hostel as well as at the National Theatre and most recently in Wild Swans at American Repertory Theater and Young Vic. Her short film Night Lives was funded by the London Borough film fund.

Anna Chen is a London-born writer and BBC freelance broadcaster whose groundbreaking documentary programmes and drama have explored East Asian diaspora subjects. She was the first Chinese British comic to take a one-woman show to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival and is a Orwell Prize shortlisted blogger.

Wondermare is a semi-acoustic trio of middle-aged Hapa actors, Melody Brown, C. Amanda Maud and Daniel York who do folk rock covers of songs about everything, but mostly about horses. Sometimes they sing in Mandarin. Mostly they rock.

Liz Chi Yen Liew is a musician and composer whose music blends rhythms and melodies inspired by her Chinese roots on Chinese instruments with electric violins and electronics. Past projects include performing/cowriting Chi2’s Monkey King – A Modern Beijing Opera, a brand new spin on the classic Chinese tale. As a session musician she has toured/recorded/performed with Moby, Lamb, Gnarls Barkley, Asian Dub Foundation, Jerry Dammers Spatial AKA Orchestra among others.

Dennis Kwong Thye Lee has been playing various traditional Chinese musical instruments since his early teens, including the guzheng, xiao, dizi, sheng and pipa and also taught and performed the guzheng professionally for over 20 years.

Sinophile, DJ and broadcaster Zoë Baxter has produced and presented 8 series of Lucky Cat – a tasty mix of East Asian and Western culture – for Resonance 104.4FM.

The 2nd International Conference & Exhibition on Semiotics and Visual Communication, held by the Cyprus Semiotics Association in conjunction with the School of The Arts at the University of Northampton will be accompanied by an Art and Design exhibition within the context of the theme ‘Culture of Seduction [the seduction of culture]’. This inclusive conference and exhibition aims to investigate the broad subject field of semiotics in its widest context, celebrating the exploration of connections, tensions, contradictions and complementarity between the diversity of outputs. The event seeks to bring together researchers, scholars and practitioners who study, evaluate and reflect upon the means by which semiotic theories can be analysed, perceived and articulated within the context of the various forms of theoretical and practice based visual communication.

After two successful series of Salons in London, Saturday Night Salon is delighted to be participating in the Asia Triennial Manchester with a one-off Salon on the topic of art and politics in Taiwan. The artists Chen Chieh-jen, Yao Jui-chung and Chen Chin- yuan will give talks, to be followed by discussion. The discussion will be an opportunity to critically reflect on the issues confronting Taiwanese artists today, and all are invited to join in. Download the flyer for the event here: SNS 2014